I Thought You Said There Was a Storm?

The RIM BlackBerry Storm conjured up a lot of hype as the first touch-screen BlackBerry to be offered. Everything seemed to be going in RIM’s favour. While the touch capabilities alone to a RIM device was stellar enough, the addition of SurePress functionality, a full feature list and a pretty competitive $199.99 price tag, all signs pointed towards guaranteed success. When the Storm was finally unleashed, its sluggish performance and design issues left it blowing in the wind.

On paper, the Storm looks phenomenal sporting a 3.25 inch HVGA touch-screen, 3.2 megapixel camera with flash and autofocus, BlackBerry OS 5.0, multi-touch, 1 GB device memory with support up to 32GB external memory, 128MB of RAM, and GPS of course. Certainly the coolest feature of the phone is the SurePress touch screen and is definitely the key selling feature.

Sadly, RIM picked the wrong feature as its selling point. The SurePress touch-screen has a pretty decent sized learning curve, not ideal for someone who wants to start up their phone and just go. The onscreen keyboard is a bit cramped in portrait mode. Any long winded e-mails need to be entered when the phone is in landscape mode to provide some comfort. Also, the phone suffered initially from some glaring performance bugs. These have since been fixed through a firmware update, however, the phone can still be sluggish.

Buyer beware, as this phone is a total niche market phone. The RIM BlackBerry Storm is perfect for CrackBerry addicts who want a touch-screen and refuse to switch carriers to get the iPhone. The Storm has potential, and that will hopefully be reached with a new design.